Residual stress effects on fatigue crack growth in different regions of aluminum alloy 7050 friction stir weld

Abstract

Different distribution of residual stress in each microregion of the joint had an intensely significant influence on the fatigue crack growth. The friction stir welding (FSW) finite element model was developed. The residual stress was imported to the fracture mechanical model by the submodel technique. The residual K rs (stress intensity factor from residual stress) approaches were used to predict the fatigue crack growth rate (FCGR) in different regions of aluminum alloy 7050 friction stir welded joints. The FRANC3D in conjunction with ABAQUS, the M-integral method was used to calculate K rs , considering the effect of K rs on the effective stress ratio, the Paris-Walker formula was used to predict the FCGR in different regions of the FSW joints. The predicting results and experimental values aligned with the better, demonstrating that the established model could accurately predict the FCGR in different regions of the FSW joints.